Such an in-wheel suspension is described, for example, in Japanese Patent Application Publication No. JP-A-10-338009. The in-wheel suspension described in this publication includes a hub that supports a wheel. The wheel mainly includes a disc and a rim. The rim has a reference width and a reference diameter. The in-wheel suspension includes a wheel carrier that defines the rotational axis of the hub, and a guide member that guides the movement of the wheel carrier with respect to a support member in the axial direction. The support member includes fitting means for fitting the support member to a chassis of a vehicle. The wheel carrier is fitted to the guide member by a long-and-thin single bar, and slides according to the guidance by the guide member. The wheel carrier is prevented from rotating on the sliding axis. The wheel carrier is fitted to the both ends of the bar. The in-wheel suspension includes means for supporting a load of the vehicle transmitted to the wheel carrier by the support member. The wheel carrier, the bar, and the guide member are housed in the wheel along the diameter defined by the reference diameter. The wheel carrier, the bar, and the guide member are housed in a limited space having a shape of a cylinder where one of the surfaces of the cylinder, which extend in the axial direction of the wheel carrier, bar, and the guide member, is defined by the disc of the wheel and the other surface is defined by a virtual surface contacting the rim.
In such an in-wheel suspension including a sliding mechanism, however, degrees of freedom in movements of a tire/wheel assembly other than the vertical/substantially vertical movement and the rotational movement are actually restricted by the sliding mechanism. This makes it difficult to change the camber angle when the tire/wheel assembly moves in the vertical/substantially vertical direction (when the tire/wheel assembly jounces/rebounds), and to change the orientation of the tire/wheel assembly such that the toe-in-angle increases when a braking force is applied. Such inconvenience does not occur, for example, in a commonly used multi-link suspension without a sliding mechanism.